San Francisco Supervisor Harvey Milk, left, talks with Gwenn Craig and Bill Kraus, co-coordinators of the San Francisco No on Prop 6 program in San Francisco, on Nov. 7, 1978, while awaiting first results from California on the controversial proposition that would see homosexual teachers fired from schools.

Months before he was slain in San Francisco, Supervisor Harvey Milk passionately argued that unless gays and lesbians left the closet, they never would change the attitudes of the straight majority.

"Invisible, we remain in limbo - a myth, a person with no parents, no brothers, no sisters, no friends who are straight, no important positions in employment," Milk proclaimed in his famous "Hope" speech in 1978.

Now, 30 years after the gay leader's assassination, a national audience will be introduced to his message through Gus Van Sant's star-studded biopic "Milk," which opens in the Bay Area tonight. In the wake of national protests and boycotts over California voters' passage of Proposition 8 - which bans same-sex marriage - a question arises: Can the dramatized Milk make the same kind of political impact as his real-life counterpart?

At the very least, many activists and media experts say, "Milk" has the potential to engage the politically inert and spark meaningful conversations about gay rights.

"It's more than a biopic of a gay politician - it's the biopic of a movement coming of age," said Neil Giuliano, president of the Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation, who used to be the closeted mayor of Tempe, Ariz. "The vast majority of Americans under, say, 35 barely know this story. ... I think, especially for young people, they will learn social justice is worth fighting for, even if they don't always win."

"What changes any one of our lives?" asked National Gay and Lesbian Task Force director Rea Carey. "It can be a media image. I certainly hope 'Milk' does that."

Former Milk aide and "Milk" consultant Cleve Jones, who recently penned an opinion piece for The Chronicle with "Milk" screenwriter Dustin Lance Black, said: " 'Milk' is just the sort of film gay people could take friends and family to see. ... It has real power to inform and inspire."

But not all experts are convinced of film's efficacy as an instrument of political change.

"I don't think movies are made, generally, to change political or social behavior," said award-winning film historian David Thomson. "Gradually, sometimes movies do have an effect ... but my instinct is to be very cautious.

"You can point to certain films that, in a very Hollywood-y way - 'The Defiant Ones,' 'In the Heat of the Night' - take very deliberate, strong attitudes toward racism, but I don't know whether they had very much effect except preaching to the converted."

Given the uproar over Prop. 8, the film's timing is dramatic.

Some of the movie's most memorable moments come as Milk and his advisers work to defeat 1978's Proposition 6 - a measure promoted by former Florida beauty queen Anita Bryant that would have barred gays and lesbians from teaching in schools.

Striking parallels

The parallels between the film's depiction of Prop. 6 and this year's vote on Prop. 8 were so striking that after the first "Milk" screenings in late October, debate erupted across film blogs about why "Milk" didn't get to general audiences before election day. Some, including Jones, thought it could have made some difference in the outcome of Prop. 8.

"The end decision was not to have the film speaking directly to the election, because if it was seen to be just about the election, that might take away its chance of having a life after the election," director Van Sant said in an interview with Filmmaker magazine.

At the film's premiere last month in San Francisco, crowds toting anti-Prop. 8 signs lined Castro Street, eager to capitalize on the film's political message. Now, some are organizing a boycott against Cinemark Theatres, a Texas chain that is showing "Milk" on its screens but whose CEO, Alan Stock, donated $9,999 to the "Yes on 8" campaign.

A YouTube employee, San Franciscan Justin Green, co-created a Facebook group and Web site for the boycott on Nov. 14. Green and fellow Facebook member Mark Rooney were aiming for 1,000 people to commit to avoiding Cinemark's "Milk" showings. The group has more than 17,000 members.

"I thought that the irony that (Stock) would be indirectly profiting from 'Milk' was terrible," said Green, 28. He also notes that he's a political neophyte. "I have never done anything like this before - I wasn't even on student council. I had no idea the film would affect me emotionally like this."

Theater chain responds

Cinemark issued a statement last week denying any companywide stance on Prop. 8: "Any individual act or contribution is just that, individual acts of personal expression, and do not reflect company positions or policy."

Although it remains unclear what role "Milk" will play in the Prop. 8 issue, experts are quick to point out that in general, positive representations of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender figures, both real and fictional, in television and film help increase acceptance, especially for young people.

"I think that pop culture and media has played a much larger role (in advancing gay rights) than people give it credit for," said San Francisco pollster David Binder. "The first mainstream (gay) roles in the '70s were enormously effective at making the general public look at gays and lesbians. ... Before that, when gays were invisible, there was this fear that gays were sordid or overly sexual, a threat to children - all these terrible stereotypes. It was initially through TV and the big screen that those stereotypes were combatted."

Binder said mainstream media representation could be more influential in public opinion of the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community than other marginalized minorities because of its ability to be hidden. "Communication methods may go further," he said. "There's a greater sense of invisibility for gays than groups that can be identified, say, by the color of skin."

Fictional identification

University of Wisconsin at Milwaukee Professor Paul Brewer, author of "Value War: Public Opinion and the Politics of Gay Rights," cites recent research on the "Virtual Contact Hypothesis" - a theory from the University of Minnesota that holds that "knowing" even fictional gay people from TV or movies reduces hostility of homosexuality as a whole - as evidence that TV and movies can sway opinion. But he says the most powerful effect is in the aggregate collection of pop culture portrayals.

"If I had a hunch, I wouldn't focus too much on any one movie or TV show. One can certainly start debate - like 'Philadelphia' or 'Ellen' - but what we know about media effects is that exposure to any one medium tends to fade over time. It's the steady exposure to positive images of gays and lesbians that changes public opinion."

In the end, "Milk" director Van Sant and Focus Features, rather than using the film as a political weapon, chose to release the film in the holiday season to ensure the largest possible audiences and optimal Oscar-grabbing attention. Their movie was a vehicle for storytelling, not political protest. However, as Harvey Milk's story gets shown in multiplexes around the country, "Milk" might well make good on the famous opening line of the politico's "Hope" speech - "I'm Harvey Milk, and I'm here to recruit you."